RED PLANET GOLD QUARTZ SPECIMEN .34 GRAM NATURAL GOLD AND QUARTZ

Description: NATIVE GOLD QUARTZ SPECIMEN from the MOTHER LODE Ruler is 1/4" wide (6 mm). U.S. 10 cent coin is 17 mm in diameter. Specimen weight: 5.2 Grains (Troy) - .34 Gram Size: 8.1X6.9X5.1 mm Check out this piece of white-burgundy ore from the Sierra Nevada Mtns. It's not large, but one corner shows a nice zone of gold. Thelively colors of this rock make a person think twice about the mundane nature of gold ores. The gold isn't pure 24K. Gold found in nature is always an alloy of metals with gold, silver, and copper being mixed together in differing proportions. Judging from the color of the precious metal, it's purity is quite high. Back when placer-mining was my trade, I dreamed of some day discovering a wash full of specimen like this. It never happened, but I still found plenty of nice nuggets and exciting paystreaks. The problem was, these successes were sporadic, and little placer gold arrived in the form of GQ specimen. Moving ahead a couple of decades, some sweet specimens finally arrived. Unfortunately, I didn't find them myself. I resorted to swinging a 'silver pick'. But, that's a better ending to a story about the gold quartz I couldn't find than it might have been. U.S. SHIPPING $4.00 (includes USPS tracking to all U.S. destinations) INTERNATIONAL CUSTOMERS S&H $15.00 FAST REFUND OFFERED (If, for any reason, you're not happy with this item). Contact me indicating you wish to return the item. As soon as it's received by me and everything's as it should be, you'll be issued a refund. I poured through old mining dumps for years looking at orange-yellow-rusty rock through a loupe, but I never found a piece with visible gold. Hydrothermal solutions carrying gold and silica crystallized into veins of gold quartz. This specimen comes from one of the many vein systems sourcing the immense placer deposits of the Sierra Nevada Mtns, the famed Mother Lode. Weight Conversions: 15.43 GRAINS = 1 GRAM 31.103 GRAMS = 1 TROY OUNCE 24 GRAINS = 1 PENNYWEIGHT (DWT) 20 DWT = 1 TROY OUNCE 480 GRAINS = 1 TROY OUNCE S&H Discounted for combined shipments. PAYMENTS For U.S. buyers: We accept paypal For intnl. customers: We accept paypal. Pay securely with www.paypal. Payment must be made within 7 days from close of auction. We ship as soon as funds clear. If you have questions, please ask them before bidding. REFUNDS We leave no stones un-turned insuring our customers get what they bargained for. If you're not satisfied with this item, contact me. Then, if the problem can't be fixed, return product within 30 days in 'as purchased' condition for a full refund QUARTZ MINING Californians were fortunate in that most gold ores mined were what is known as "free-milling". After the rock was crushed up and the gold released, the latter would amalgamate readily with quicksilver. There were some exceptions. Mill men discovered that many times, gold was enclosed inside various forms of metallic sulphides colloquially known as 'sulphurets.' Mercury could not come into contact with gold so long as it was locked up in these sulphides. Sometimes, gold and pyrite occur together in relatively equal parts.To the men of that period, it seemed that mere mechanical treatment of the ore was ineffective at releasing the gold and therefore chemistry and metallurgy had to be used before progress could be achieved. This was too complex a problem for the average California mill operator of the 1850s and since the loss through sulphurets was relatively small, he was able to thrust it out of his mind for the time being. Excerpt from MINING FRONTIERS OF THE FAR WEST 1848-1880 by Rodman Wilson Paul GREEN GOLDPlacer platinum, a rare, even more exotic metal than gold, is found in North America; one of the more impressive deposits being British Columbia's Tulameen River and it's tributaries. Trinity County, California also boasts of considerable production in Platinum Group Metals as does the northwest coast of Alaska, especially the Good News Bay region. Historians delving into early North American platinum discoveries (i.e. the 1800s) note that gold miners recovered heavy, silver-grey metal in their sluice boxes and were at a loss to identify this raw, metallic-looking element. Lacking the wealth of mineralogical knowledge available today, they deduced it must be 'green gold'. Since it was heavy like gold and looked somewhat like gold, they figured it simply hadn't ripened enough to be valuable and threw it away. Having mined PGMs (platinum group metals) myself, some of which were difficult to identify, I've no trouble believing this story about British Columbia miners. One unusual matrix nugget I found weighed 43 grains (Troy). It was recovered from my dredging operation on the Trinity River, California. After being stashed for 20 years without ever being certifiably identified, thanks to a customer, I found out that indeed the nugget was platinum (Pt) in a dunite host. You just don't find platinum with matrix and yet here I had accidentally found one. A major problem with going back in to mine some of these deposits is that mechanized placer-mining in California has fallen into disfavor with government bureaucrats. I'd be happy to take and introduce them to the joys of small-scale placer mining in The Golden State. Thanks for checking out our diggins' Gold of Eldorado 10-11-18

Price: 20 USD

Location: Banks, Oregon

End Time: 2025-01-07T19:07:52.000Z

Shipping Cost: 4 USD